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Revision as of 23:28, 26 May 2019
Alexandra Lesley Phillips (born 26 December 1983) is a Brexit Party politician and activist, elected as a member of the European Parliament for the South East England constituency at the European Parliament elections of May 2019. As second candidate, after Nigel Farage, at close of poll she seemed certain to be elected,[1] and was.
Born in December 1983,[2] Phillips studied journalism, and while she was a student made a film about the UK Independence Party. She has written that she was captivated by Nigel Farage and supported the party's position on the European Union, bringing back grammar schools, and "energy security over and above well-intentioned but overly-injurious carbon reduction initiatives", so joined the party. She rose within it to be its head of media for three years,[3] and from 2014 to 2015 was also a director of Speechwright Limited.[2] Phillips was being paid £80,000 a year as UKIP's head of media, but resigned suddenly in 2015[4] to move to Wales and take a leading role in the UKIP campaign for the National Assembly for Wales election of 2016.[5] She originally planned to stand as a candidate in that election, but withdrew before the nominations were finalized.[4] Soon after the European Union membership referendum of 23 June 2016, Phillips left UKIP, at around the same time as Farage, and in September 2016 joined the Conservatives, a few weeks after Theresa May had been elected as leader.[3] She stayed on as a media advisor to Nathan Gill, a UKIP MEP and Welsh Assembly member who had become an independent in the Assembly after being beaten by Neil Hamilton for the position of group leader there. On changing party, Phillips gave an interview to BBC Wales in which she said that UKIP had established a foothold in Wales, but that it had now become "a war zone".[6] She also spoke to The Guardian, stating that "ideologically the Tories are doing the Ukip dance now" and making comments critical of Neil Hamilton.[5]
In early May 2019, Phillips was announced as a Brexit Party candidate for the European Parliament,[7] and soon after that she was also a writer for the Brexitcentral.com web site.[8]
Confusingly, a Green Party candidate in the same South East Region was also called Alexandra Phillips, and as first candidate on her party's list was also almost certain to be elected.[9] The Brexit Party has commented on this unusual situation “The two are both in a great position to get elected and it could well be an electoral first anywhere to return two MEPs with identical names, let alone in the same region.” The Green Party's Alexandra Phillips is also known as Alex, which may prove to be the way to avoid confusion.[7]
Notes
- ^ BMG’s Final European Voting Intention Poll dated 22/05/19, accessed 26 May 2019
- ^ a b Speechwright Limited at companieshouse.gov.uk, accessed 26 May 2019
- ^ a b Alexandra Phillips, Alexandra Phillips: Why I left UKIP and joined May’s Conservative Party dated September 20, 2016] at conservativehome.com, accessed 26 May 2019
- ^ a b Simon Walters and Glen Owen, "What's that girl doing on my sofa?" in The Mail on Sunday dated 11 February 2017, updated 1 May 2019, accessed 26 May 2019
- ^ a b Anushka Asthana, Rowena Mason, in The Guardian dated 16 September 2016, updated on Tue 13 Mar 2018
- ^ UKIP in Wales a war zone, says Nathan Gill adviser dated 16 September 2016 at bbc.co.uk/news, accessed 26 May 2019
- ^ a b Frank le Duc, Two candidates called Alexandra Phillips stand in European elections in Brighton & Hove News dated 7 May 2019
- ^ Alexandra Phillips at brexitcentral.com, accessed 26 May 2019
- ^ Alexandra Phillips, I’m standing to be an MEP because voters deserve more than a sticking plaster for Brexit at independent.co.uk, accessed 26 May 2019
External links
- Alexandra Phillips, Let’s challenge the Remainers’ slurs and smears with an unashamedly positive Brexit agenda dated 19 May 2019